Kurt, have you ever thought of putting a trip group together (for profit) that want to go experiences the "Toyota Porn" in person, and pay extra to touch or have the girl friend experience? If you have I am in! I am serious. I bet you could put a trip together and charge handsome fee's to make it worth your time to take groups over for trips.
P.S. I signed your non-compete form... Remember the HOA ideas.
Australia is very expensive to travel, i.e. a can of Coke is $3 and fuel is up to ~$15/gallon in the remote places.
HOA? Remind me what we were talking about there. As a funny side note, one of my routines on road trips and big adventures is to brainstorm crazy/funny business ideas with my traveling companions and jot them down in my travel journal. From Baja for example we took home 20-25 funny yet often practical business venture ideas and I'm up to another dozen from my travels in Australia. On a more serious note myself and a few partners have spent a very considerable amount of time investigating, planning and logistificating (yes, my new word) the idea of a 4x4 tour outfit in Utah that offers an Aussie like experience without the $5000 airfare and accommodations... let alone the 4x4 hire, food, fuel, etc. We are 95% ready to roll out, but you can't quit your day-job (or skip big trips) to roll-out something that may or may not work in the long run. I have no doubt we can make it work for some years and cater to a neat group of clientele but the same additional effort pointed at my current endeavors would likely produce a greater end result. Long story short, I have too many irons in the fire and need to hire people to help me out.
I'm very, very lucky and grateful to be part of such an extraordinary and unique trip with such fantastic people. I can't thank Greg, Scott and team enough for including me in what is bound to be history making trip. I'll touch more on that in my official E7-Australia trip report when the adventure ends... I've still got 2500 kms and 1.5 weeks to go
To bring this full circle, this is one of our fill-ups in a remote area, factor in the weak US dollar and you'll see that Expeditions7 is a remarkable adventure that is no light undertaking.
